Setting up your Minecraft server is only the beginning, you'll also have to wield the powers of an operator to remove unsavory characters who might destroy what you and others have worked so hard to construct. Check out our full list of Minecraft server commands.

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If you’re planning on leaving your Minecraft server running even when you’re not playing on it, it might be a good idea to designate a few people as operators, or ops. These empowered individuals will be able to kick and ban players who cause trouble on your server, among other things.

There are a variety of commands available to ops on a server, and our full listing will ensure you know exactly what your ops can and cannot do in Minecraft mulitplayer.

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Designate Your Ops

Once you’ve gotten your server configured the way you like it, the next logical step is to designate those whom you’d like to be able to police it. You do this by adding their names to the ops.txt file in the Minecraft Server folder.

Open up the folder, then use a text editor like Notepad to add the usernames of those you’d like to designate as ops to the file. One name per line, and simply close and save the list when you’re done.

You’ll have to restart the server for the changes to take effect, but once you do everyone on your list should have full operator privileges.

Don’t forget to add your own name to the list, unless you want your operators to be able to boot you from your own server.

Now that your ops are all set up, let’s take a look at what all they can do on the server. Commands are entered by first pressing “t” to bring up the chat window, then entering a “/” followed by the desired command.

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Communication/Informational Commands

One of the most important commands to remember is /help or /?. Using this command will bring up an in-game list of all the other available commands.

/list will give you a list of all players currently connected to the server.

/say (message) will allow you to send a server-wide message without a name in front of it. The message will appear in pink text and is similar to the system messages used in MMORPGs. Example: “/say shutting down the server in five minutes.”

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Player Access Commands

Use the /kick command to forcibly remove any player from your server. They will be able to instantly reconnect should they choose, so this one is more of a warning than a solution to an abusive player. Example: /kick annoyingguy

The /ban command allows you to take a more permanent stance against offending individuals. Banning someone will prevent them from connecting until such time as you choose to remove them from the naughty list. Example: /ban reallyannoyingguy

The /pardon command is how you remove that individual from the naughty list. Example: /pardon reallyannoyingguy

/ban-ip allows you to ban not only a single player’s account, but any other accounts on that same ip from connecting to the server. Example: /ban-ip 192.168.1.1

/pardon-ip lets you remove an IP from the banned list. Example: /pardon-ip 192.168.1.1

Use the /op command to give operator status to another player. Example: /op BenjaminSell

Conversely, you can use the /deop to strip an operator of their powers. Example: /deop BenjaminSell

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Whitelist Commands

The whitelist allows you to control who can connect to your server. Once you’ve enabled it in the server configuration file, you can then add and remove players at will, and only those who are currently on the list will be allowed to play on your server.

The /whitelist on/off command does exactly what you’d expect, turning the whitelist feature on and off. Example: /whitelist on

Use the /whitelist add/remove commands to add and remove players from the list. If you want to add your buddy, and his account name is “coolguy,” then you would type /whitelist add coolguy into the chit window. If, later on, coolguy turns out to be not so cool, just type /whitelist remove coolguy to get rid of him permanently.

/whitelist list will show you an in-game roster of all players currently on the whitelist.

Finally, the /whitelist reload allows you to reload the whitelist if you’ve been making changes to the whitelist file outside of the game.

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Server Manipulation Commands

Tired of waiting for one player to join your mining party? use the /tp command to instantly teleport them to the location of a designated player. So, if coolguy is wasting time and you want him to arrive next to another player named /impatientguy, just type /tp coolguy impatient guy to instantly move coolguy to impatientguy’s location.

It’s also possible to add items to a player’s inventory using the /give command. You’ll have to look up the data value id of the item you’re going to create, then use this command to give it to a designated player. For example, if you’re adding two blocks of dirt to coolguy’s inventory, you’d type /give coolguy 3 2 because the data value id of dirt is “3” and you are adding two units.

The /stop command shuts down the server, use it carefully.

/save-all will force a server-wide save.

/save-off will disable all terrain saving and /save-on will turn it back on.

You don’t need help from Doc Brown to manipulate time in Minecraft, just use the /time add and /time set commands. Time values can be entered in any value between 0 and 24000, where 0 is dawn and 12000 is nightfall. use /time add to add the designated amount of time units to the current time and /time set to instantly switch to the designated time.